


Ya'aburnee

by gay-theprayaway (otomemiyakatsumi331)



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eruri Week 2015, M/M, eruri - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-12
Updated: 2015-08-12
Packaged: 2018-04-14 09:44:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4559922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otomemiyakatsumi331/pseuds/gay-theprayaway
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>ya'aburnee: an untranslatable Arabic word meaning "you bury me", implying that one would prefer to die before another for fear of living without that person.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ya'aburnee

**Author's Note:**

> This is a very late entry for Eruri week 2015, could be interpreted as Confession, Touch, Scars, Healing, or Trust

There’s an inherent strangeness to their relationship- if it could even be called that. It’s a slow, unintentional, but inevitable fall. The slip of an endearment from between lips, never unnoticed. The unconscious way they inch closer to each other when they sit. The way that Levi crawls against Erwin’s side when they’re alone reading documents in his office together. And Erwin repeats firmly to Mike, to Hanji, to himself that this is nothing; they are company for each other, a distraction. Nothing more. But while he can lie to the others, he can’t lie to himself, and he can’t pretend that sometimes he doesn’t imagine what it would be like to be able to let it go where he wants it to go. It’s a strange, intangible thing that Erwin craves, the feeling of pressing a hand into a lover’s back while walking down the street, of intertwined fingers, of the soft words spoken during the night translating into laughter over breakfast.  


There’s no one who either of them would rather see. They lead lives that are different and the same, but Erwin knows that the pain in his own life will likely never measure up to the pain that destroys Levi every day. Erwin knows little of his past- doesn’t ask- and thinks that he never will. Until one day when Levi mentions ever so nonchalantly his own abuse, and hints at the horrors lurking under the surface of his disinterested face. Erwin knew to some extent that life in the underground was miserable, but he truly had no idea just how miserable. He struggles to keep silent and composed as Levi speaks of his mother, of beatings, of painful rapes, of torture as if it all means nothing to him. Erwin looks down at his hands which have touched Levi so casually, so carelessly, and he wonders if this is meant to be a sign to him. He doesn’t know how to respond to these stories, the only thing that can pass through his dry mouth is a pitiful, “I’m sorry.”  


Levi barks a laugh at that. Tells Erwin that it’s long since past and he doesn’t need to be sorry for it. But after his story when Erwin removes Levi’s shirt and tenderly traces the scars that he now knows the history of, he can see the way that Levi’s jaw tenses. They fit themselves together, pressing skin on skin- warm, soft and slow- and it’s all very suddenly more intimate than they dare to acknowledge. They fall asleep facing away from each other, and the next morning Erwin wakes up to find the other side of the bed cold.  


It’s an inevitable fall, indeed, and Erwin finds that when he stops trying to explain to Hanji and Mike and himself, it becomes much easier to do what he wants. He knows deep within the recesses of his mind that they are not destined to be- he knows because he’s imagined every potential scenario despite himself- but he still finds a strange sort of reverence and relief in claiming Levi’s body and maybe even his soul. It is selfish, but Erwin has never pretended not to be. He accepts Levi’s gifts as a form of sustenance, a way to remind himself that in some ways he is still human. And the one scenario that he keeps coming back to is the one that he knows will come true. He asks Levi about it once as they lay together in Erwin’s bed, Levi’s head against his heart.  


“It’s not that I want to die, I just accepted the fact that I will. I dedicated myself to this cause... to your cause. It’s not like I have much to live for besides that.”  


Erwin silently strokes a long scar that threads down Levi’s forearm and wonders how he knows that when Levi says “your cause” he means Erwin himself.  


He supposes it’s the closest they will ever come to love.


End file.
